Due to high costs, low availability, and other issues persisting, the Air Force’s most important program is facing increasingly stringent scrutiny.

Despite its stable combat performance, the F-35’s high maintenance costs and continued parts supply problems continue to drag down the fifth-generation fighter jets. As Congress prepares to accept the Biden administration’s first budget, it provided ammunition to critics.  

     Lockheed Martin delivers F-35s at a rate of about 11 per month, of which about 5 are delivered to the Air Force, and most of them are delivered as planned. The operator seemed satisfied with its combat performance. But parts issues, engine support issues that take years to resolve, and evolving performance-based logistics concepts suggest that once the Biden administration installs a new defense procurement team, a planned overhaul may be imminent.  

In early March, the Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee (HASC) Adam Smith (D-Wash.) loudly questioned at an event at the Brookings Institution whether there was any way to "reduce our losses" on the F-35. He called maintenance costs "cruel" and described the plan as a "trap." In the middle of this month, at the HASC preparation subcommittee hearing, the chairperson Representative John Caramendi complained that "the entire F-35 system is very worrying." 

"We bought more planes," Carmendi said, "but we can't maintain old planes. Therefore, the more we buy, the worse the overall performance. That will stop."

He stated that Congress will instruct the Air Force to provide a "comprehensive maintenance plan" in the coming months, demonstrating that it can subtly manage new and classified systems, including the F-35. Garamendi stated that the service must demonstrate that the maintenance requirements of the new system are understood and will be appropriately funded. If it can't, it needs to determine which systems it can have.

The more we buy, the worse the overall performance. That will stop

- represent. John Garamendi, Chairman of the HASC Preparation Subcommittee

General Mark D. Kelly, head of the Air Combat Command, visited the F-35's manufacturing and support facilities in March, hoping to see evidence that the F-35's availability is improving and the cost of $36,000 per flight hour is falling. But Kelly said he didn't believe it.

"The conclusion is that the Air Force is committed to the F-35 and its ability to meet our national security requirements," Kelly said in an email answering questions. Echoing the Chief of Staff General Charles Q. Brown Jr., he referred to the F-35 as the "cornerstone" of the combat air force.

"But like any cornerstone, it must be strong enough to support the rest of the Air Force fighter," Kelly added. 

The question is whether the F-35 program can achieve its stated goal of reducing the cost per flight hour to US$25,000 (calculated in US dollars in fiscal year 2012) by 2025. After adjusting for inflation, it is equivalent to US$28,867 in 2021. Assuming an inflation rate of 3%, it is equivalent to US$32,233 in 2025. 

"Rational parties can disagree without being unpleasant," Kelly said. "Lockheed Martin still believes that US$25,000 can be achieved by 2025, and I am still not full of confidence." Assuming the current cost inflation rate is 3%, maintenance costs must be reduced by more than 35% to achieve this goal. 

The risk couldn't be greater: the Air Force needs "capable, usable, and affordable F-35s as part of a well-designed fighter force design to outperform any competitors," he said.

Kelly added that the F-35 performed well in deployment, proving its courage.  

"We have used F-35s in/around the Russian integrated air defense network in Syria for 18 consecutive months, and the Marine Corps and [British] Royal Navy are using F-35Bs in global operations," he said. "For this, I want to say that it has been'shaken' and it has performed very well in a controversial environment." 

From April 2019 to October 2020, in the three six-month deployments at Hill Air Force Base in Utah, 42 F-35s flew more than 1,300 sorties-an average of 5 hours per sortie-and dropped 350 Weapons and fired 3,700 shells, while maintaining an average mission capability rate of 70%. These jets are supported by 1,100 pilots.

However, Kelly said that the Air Force wants to strengthen it, aiming to "from [performance]'excellent in a competitive environment' to'excellent in a competitive environment'", which requires technology update 3 upgrades to "unlock" the jet Improved Block 4 of the aircraft.

Tech Refresh 3 (TR3 for short) includes a new core processor, a radar upgrade and a new cockpit display, as well as many software improvements, including enhanced electronic warfare capabilities. Block 4 is the preferred model of the Air Force.

Brown said at the Air Force Association’s Aerospace Warfare Symposium in February that speeding up the acquisition of F-35s is a way to speed up the modernization of its fighter force, but Kelly said this is unlikely. "I will follow the plans of [HQ, Air Force], but I don't think the current budget environment can support the strong'acceleration' of many plans," he said. The Air Force’s record plan remains unchanged at 1,763 F-35As. But at the current rate of 60 people per year, it will take the early 2040s to achieve this goal.  

Getting the correct version is a factor that slows down the program. A spokeswoman for the Joint Project Office (JPO) said in March that some services “have to readjust” their F-35 procurement plans, or “decided that they would rather buy later and stick to the Block 4 capabilities.” 

Lockheed's long-term F-35 project manager Gregory M. Ulmer (Gregory M. Ulmer) was recently promoted to F-35 executive vice president, and the next three F-35 production batches currently under negotiation will In total, there are 100 aircraft less than the previous three batches. Aeronautics.     

Kelly said the Air Force was keenly aware that it could not afford the luxury of spending decades developing new aircraft, and admitted that the F-35 took too long. In the prolonged war against violent extremism, the enemy cannot "punish" the US Air Force and its sister services because they are fighting the "aging fleet" or carrying out capital restructuring and modernization efforts. These efforts are either more costly than planned or delivered. Delay, or deliver less instead of full capacity. "But in battles with peer opponents, this is not the case. 

Time is of the essence now. He said that Block 4 F-35 "can compete and win in the same level of war." "So we need TR3 to show up on time."

A spokeswoman for the F-35 Joint Project Office stated that the TR3 upgrade "will be delivered to the 15th batch in 2023 as needed." 

Kelly said that the Air Force "is still expected to have more than 20 combat-ready F-35 squadrons in our inventory by 2030," which is a capability required by the National Defense Strategy. If the U.S. Air Force has 24 jet squadrons, then 20 squadrons will account for only 480 aircraft, indicating that the Air Force can reach this number in 2027. If the Air Force continues to purchase aircraft at the current rate of 60 aircraft per year, it will add another 8 squadrons around 2030. What will happen beyond that is unclear, but if there are other options, it may leave room for the program to end early. 

The Air Force is indeed considering other options. At the Aerospace Warfare Symposium, Kelly painstakingly supported the Next Generation Air Superiority (NGAD) program and developed the sixth-generation capabilities before China.

He said at the video press conference: "I don't know... before people like China use it and use it against us, whether our country has the courage and focus on deploying this capability." He said that the United States' The method of warfare is to control the air supremacy. "Without it, it is not suitable for combat."

A new joint service combat aircraft study currently underway will assess the needs of the combat air force and the combination of aircraft required in the future. This combination may include NGAD, F-35, F-15EX and unmanned aircraft, which can be equipped with weapons or provide electronic warfare escort. Another possibility is low-cost manned aircraft used in low-threat environments, and low-cost "wearable" unmanned aircraft designed for dozens or more missions, but the price is cheap enough that they are fighting The loss in will be acceptable.

The Biden administration will have to officially announce the end of the F-35's 20-year development plan and promote full-rate production at some point. Due to the difficulty of injecting F-35 into the joint simulation environment, this is a wargame game system used to simulate the number and type of wargames. This milestone was delayed by the President [Donald J.] Trump’s Pentagon’s procurement and maintenance of the Tsar Ellen Lord by 18 More than months. A weapon system that dominates in various battle scenarios is required.

A JPO spokesperson said that it will take several months to discuss this issue again, but the project office does not expect "full speed" to lead to a rapid increase in production. The real effect will be to allow the Pentagon to make purchases for many years and thus benefit from cost savings. 

Ulmer said that given the reduction in the number of batches 15 to 17 and the more advanced Block 4 configuration, the downward trend in F-35 unit costs will be difficult to continue. 

F-35 maintenance problems often boil down to a common problem: Early on, the plan made optimistic predictions about the availability of parts, warehouses, and well-trained maintenance personnel. The shortage of these three causes the reduced mission availability of the garrison troops, because the parts and technicians must prioritize the deployment of troops.

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) linked the low mission capability rate to the shortage of parts in April 2019, and progress is still slow. Since suppliers produce multiple versions of parts—not only for models A, B, and C, but also for different configurations for each model—it has proven difficult to obtain enough spare parts. To complicate matters, the available parts must be shared among F-35's 16 partner countries. GAO accused the U.S. military of not fully counting the F-35 parts they possess and their locations. It reported that the parts carried by the Marine Corps F-35 deployment sometimes proved to be incompatible with the deployed aircraft.

Project officials report that speeding up parts turnover in warehouses may help, but so far, the increase in aircraft availability is due to the increasing use of common configurations of jet aircraft. 

Ken Merchant, vice president of sustainability for the Lockheed F-35, said in February that parts supply is improving. He said that the parts with a "fill rate" of 47% are now 97%, and the situation should continue to improve, because it is only two years away from the five-year improvement plan.

The problem with the F-35's Pratt & Whitney F135 engine is also an obstacle. The F-35 Joint Project Office admits that the worst-case scenario is that by 2025, the Air Force may have 20% of F-35As without a working engine.

There are several problems: the government has not ordered enough F135 engines and engine modules—independent parts of the engine—to achieve the required availability. The F-35 engine library has not kept up, both because Pratt is slow to deliver tools and equipment, and because the library does not hire and train enough people to complete the work.

"This is a vicious circle," an Air Force support official said. "Until we have all the tools available to them, we can't hire all the people who need it." Pratt "Catch up most of the time, but recruiters need time...especially in the context of a pandemic. " 

F-35 is also a challenge to protect the international nature of the company. "Technically speaking, we don't'own' the engine," the official said. "We have generated the next one. Any partner can use a specific engine." 

The engine is available in two versions: one for the U.S. Air Force Type A and Navy Type C, and the other for the F-35B short-range takeoff/vertical landing type. 

An industry official pointed out that with the end of the F-35 development phase, the engine configuration should be more stable, which will allow suppliers to focus on smaller variant parts libraries, thereby increasing availability. 

"Basically, the spare parts they predicted [are] used in the maturity stage of the program, and we are only getting there now," an industry official said. "But it means we have entered this stage...backlog." 

Industry officials also stated that Pratt’s suppliers have not kept pace with the company’s requirements. Officials said that the F135 pipeline has about 12% of the buffer of spare engines and modules, but in fact it should be 25% to 30%. An official at the Pentagon said that since Pratt is a leader in providing engines, negotiations are underway to produce additional engines and modules.

An industry official said: "If your warehouse can quickly reverse the engine, you can have fewer engines." "If the warehouse can't keep up with the speed, then you will have a shortage."

Another problem of the F135 engine is related to the coating on the fan blades of the high-pressure turbine section. When sand (calcium, magnesium, aluminum silicate) called CMAS in the Middle East is ingested and heated in HPT, it melts into glass, which damages the blade coating. Pratt started using the new coating a year ago, and so far it seems to be more durable, making the blades last longer. How long it will take is still unknown. 

Kelly said that he has no plans to restrict F-35 deployment to the Middle East, but the potential engine shortage has been resolved in the short term.

The desert environment is the "only factor" that limits engine life. Kelly said, "There are also total engine hours, engine life, foreign body damage, warehouse throughput, etc." In order to further alleviate engine shortages, ACC reduced the F-35 demonstration team's Schedule, free up engines to "meet combat training and wartime requirements." 

Lockheed Martin presented a performance-based logistics (PBL) proposal to F-35 partners in 2019, and company officials said in February that they expect to receive a single-source proposal request this summer. According to Merchant, the plan has "shrunk", but the company is confident that it can reach a cost of $25,000 per flight hour by 2025, even so. The company is proposing a five-year deal, which includes possible arrangements for the next five years.

Pentagon officials said that JPO rejected more far-reaching plans because it was unwilling to give Lockheed more power to maintain the company. 

Merchant said that suppliers can save costs through more economical large-volume orders. Merchant said that Lockheed has entered into five-year deals with some of its suppliers, even though it has signed annual contracts with the government to get “correct behavior” from suppliers that had problems before.

Lockheed and JPO are replacing the F-35's troubled Autonomous Logistics Information System (ALIS) in favor of a renamed and upgraded Operational Data Integration Network (ODIN). Lockheed officials said that the old system is based on technology 20 years ago and needs to be updated on a large scale. The new system is expected to be more secure, produce fewer errors, and be easier to use.

ODIN will completely replace ALIS by the end of 2022, providing a deeper understanding of F-35 parts usage and service operations, and achieving improved predictive maintenance.

If various efforts to improve the maintenance of the F-35 bear fruit, the Air Force’s inventory may actually be close to 1,763 Lightning IIs. But at the current rate, plus other projects are seeking funding and attention, the F-35 may be just a bridge to the future combat air force, rather than the destination once envisaged.

"Air Force Magazine" is the official publication of the United States Air Force Association, address: 1501 Lee Highway, Arlington, Va., 22209-1198. Copyright 2020.